Coronavirus: UK could be worst hit country in Europe, government medical adviser says

Sage member says there are ‘lessons to learn’ from failure to follow WHO testing advice

The UK could be hit harder by the coronavirus than any other country in Europe, a medical adviser to the government has warned.

“Numbers in the UK have continued to go up,” Sir Jeremy Farrar – a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) – told the BBC’s Andrew Marr.

“And yes, the UK is likely to be certainly one of the worst, if not the worst affected country in Europe.”

Until it was surpassed hours ago by the United States, Italy had suffered more Covid-19 deaths than any country. Its official death toll sits at nearly 20,000, with Spain not lagging far behind.

Despite having had more time to prepare for the looming crisis, the UK has now set its own grim records, announcing the highest daily hospital death toll in Europe on Friday.

Asked about Sir Jeremy’s analysis that the UK – set to surpass 10,000 fatalities – could have Europe’s worst death rate, business secretary Alok Sharma later told the broadcaster: “Different countries are at different stages of this cycle. We are at different trajectories.

Mr Sharma said the government’s lockdown measures were starting to work, and will stay in place “until we have advice from Sage in terms of the evidence that is out there”.

Sir Jeremy said it was “inevitable” there would be “lessons to learn” from other countries’ approaches, notably their more advanced testing regimes.

Asked why the UK did not follow the World Health Organisation‘s advice to “test, test, test”, Sir Jeremy noted that “every country” has struggled to obtain enough kits, but said it was a “critical component” of any response.

He said continuing testing in the community would “buy you time” to deal with the crisis, giving an additional six to eight weeks to ensure health systems were up to capacity.

“Undoubtedly there are lessons to learn from that,” said Sir Jeremy, who has also advised the WHO and the German government, which he praised for its “remarkable” Covid-19 testing capacity.

“I think that’s played a key role in Germany – at the moment – being able to keep the number of people hospitalised and the number of people tragically dying at a low level.

“It is still early in this epidemic though, and what is critical for Germany is that they continue that testing and isolation. Inevitably the UK will learn lessons from how Germany has managed to control the epidemic to date.”

In the face of mounting pressure, health secretary Matt Hancock has pledged to increase testing capacity to 100,000 per day by the end of the month.

Despite having first developed a working test for Covid-19 on 10 January, days after China’s first fatality, the government largely waited until mid-March to reach out to laboratories across the country for assistance, according to Reuters.

Sir Jeremy also highlighted concerns that ethnic minorities are being hit harder by the virus, with all of the first 10 frontline NHS staff to lose their lives being BAME medics.

“There is some evidence growing both in the United States and here in Europe that people from BAME backgrounds are more at risk,” he said.

“What is critical to work out is whether that is something specific to that background or is it related to other risk factors we know about – age, other illness people have: diabetes, people who are obese have been more affected, people with high blood pressure, people with heart disease, lung disease.”

He also referenced “almost 100 reports” of cases in South Korea where people had seemingly re-contracted coronavirus, casting fresh doubt over how long post-infection immunity was thought to last.

“It is critical to understand whether that is one viral infection that has persisted in an individual for a considerable time and has now reactivated or whether they have been infected with a second virus,” said Sir Jeremy.

“Either way, it suggests that immunity perhaps in some people is not complete and that has major ramifications for the ability to make a vaccine and for the community to be protected against future waves.”

Additional reporting by PA